Spyglass In Reverse
by Silver Harmony
Summary: In which Kuramochi Youichi repeatedly walks in on things he doesn't want to see, and doesn't know what he'd ever done to deserve it. Miyuki Kazuya x Sawamura Eijun.


**Title:** _Spyglass In Reverse_  
><strong>Author:<strong> Harmony (Silver Harmony)  
><strong>CharactersPairing:** Miyuki x Sawamura, Kuramochi  
><strong>Rating:<strong> M  
><strong>Word Count:<strong> Approximately 4,259.  
><strong>Disclaimer:<strong> Not mine – otherwise this pairing would be canon.  
><strong>Notes:<strong> All I can say is LOL seriously what the actual hell did I just write.  
><strong>Feedback:<strong> Very much appreciated, as I need it to improve. Thank you!

...

Youichi holds no real belief in karma. Day-to-day life is simple and straightforward enough to live through, particularly at Seidō, and he has no interest in taking stock of elaborate concepts and principles like divine causality. Still, a small part of him is starting to think that perhaps the universe is somehow attempting to balance itself out, owing to all the dirty glimpses he's taken of his underclassman's phone in the past.

Because that's essentially where it all begins. Nothing else is different: everyone awakens bleary-eyed with rebirth at their usual chosen times of the morning, Sawamura is determinedly out the door before anybody else to do his own laps in the crisp daybreak cold, and Youichi spares himself ten minutes before early practice to nose through his kouhai's phone for potentially delicious messages from the humble childhood friend back home. Just a regular Tuesday morning.

And that's when he notices, with surprise, that the inbox is inundated with messages that had been sent not by Wakana, but by Miyuki of all people, each one time-stamped within the ungodly hours of the night before. That's bizarre; he hadn't known that the two of them corresponded in this way, even though only a handful of meters of distance separate their living quarters and they practically see each other daily anyway.

Youichi thumbs one mail open inquisitively, and it reads: _Mmm, good. Show me more?_

Sawamura's response retorts: _You first. Fair's fair, Miyuki Kazuya_. An evidently self-timed photo is attached – in the glow of pale torchlight Sawamura is sitting back leisurely on his bed, soft hair falling over a mellow gold gaze and the pad of a lean thumb pressed to the corner of barely-parted lips; his trousers sit low on his hips with ease, unbuttoned the entire way down, and a slender hand is discreetly slid into the front of his underwear, curved knuckles faintly straining its waistband downward in the promise of _more, I will give more._

Youichi's mouth runs dry.

* * *

><p>So he'd been sound asleep in the upper bunk when the messages were exchanged, blissfully unaware of anything going on underneath him. Sawamura had just brazenly lolled about at two o'clock in the morning, <em>sexting.<em>

Youichi rolls the word languorously around his tongue to remind himself that it's real, because now he has to wrap his brain around the fact that his roommate is actually capable of being a perfectly normal teenage boy who answers to the call of his dick like any other healthy adolescent boy would, and isn't just a boisterous, overconfident, glossy-eyed dumbass whose mind is crammed only with thoughts of baseball.

Enlightenment is a strange thing, the way it tips worlds on its sides and casts rays of light on shadowed cracks and corners. He hadn't even known that Sawamura and Miyuki had some _thing_ – or whatever the hell it is that's going on between them. All the messages are gone from Sawamura's phone the next morning, however; he'd probably simply been stupidly late in eradicating the evidence. Youichi can almost happily convince himself that it had all been a wild hallucination, except he knows it's not, because the searing burn of all the photographs that he can no longer unsee is far too vivid to merely be pictures of his mind's eye.

Yet even the dirty pictures don't prepare him for _actually walking in on them_ – nothing in all the world can cushion that blow – during his laundry day, when he's carelessly slinging his bag of grubby clothes over his shoulder, a tuneless whistle blowing through his lips; and he spies Norifumi sitting on the ground outside the dormitory's laundry room when he gets there, his own forgotten basket of clothes laid by his elbow, dark hair innocently dishevelled and mild misery carved into the lines of his face.

'Nori,' Youichi blinks. 'Everything alright?'

'Yeah,' the pitcher answers modestly, seeming to straighten himself out. But his voice falters in mild hesitancy, uttering: 'Just – don't go into the laundry room for now. I tried going in, too. It's totally occupied.'

Youichi curls his mouth askew at that. 'By who? I thought no one else did their laundry on Thursday afternoons apart from me and you?'

He steps up to the door, taking no notice of Nori's sudden flustered squawk, and slides it open halfway – and that's the exact moment that the tightness on his face falls away and he regrets everything.

Because Sawamura is hoisted up onto one of the washing machines, seated languidly upon its edge; he's entirely unclothed from the waist down, lean legs splayed up and around Miyuki's pelvis, the faint jut of hips warmly cradled by Sawamura's thighs. Miyuki is standing nearly flush against him, trousers undone and slid halfway down the curve of his otherwise bare ass, droplets of sweat following the arched dip of his lower spine; his fingers are lightly divided over the hollow of Sawamura's waist, a single thumb brushing across the soft lines of his ribs, his pale white teeth flitting delicately around the shell of the other boy's ear. Sawamura's fingers curl around the taut muscles of Miyuki's upper arm and Miyuki's hands shift to dig blunt fingernails firmly into the bones of Sawamura's hips, and they're rocking steadily against each other, _into_ one another, hitching breaths low and heated, keeping their unwavering rhythm even as Sawamura exhales Miyuki's name into his hair.

Youichi flings the door shut so impressively fast that it's a miracle it doesn't snap off its hinges.

Blood pumps rapidly like drums in his ears and heat washes over his face like a curtain of steam; he squeezes his eyes closed tightly and takes a deep, slow breath because now he feels filthier than his dirty laundry, and also _what the hell._

Nori gives two hesitant pats to his back in sympathy, but at least has the good grace not to say a word.

* * *

><p>He's almost tempted to think that Miyuki must be doing this on purpose.<p>

Miyuki Kazuya's frequent grins are all teeth. Wide, near-feral, brilliant rows of white, white teeth that look like they've sprouted from the deepest, nastiest core of his bones. It fits in seamlessly with every other part of him like a piece of a puzzle – firmly rooted in that organically twisted personality, full of self-satisfied smirks and unbearably cocky wit, and an impression of untamed cheer which he tends to naturally radiate like a beacon that, honestly, ends up grating on everyone's nerves eventually. Youichi reckons that at this point, adding _shameless deviant_ to his classmate's repertoire of characteristics may not be too farfetched.

He's especially convinced of this when he's the only one left doing swings right before dinnertime on Monday afternoon, and thus is the only one left to head back to put his bat away afterwards; and perhaps he should be smarter about what he hears in the equipment shed, but he's always had a lot of faith in Miyuki – which he agonizingly regrets in circumstances like this.

'It's making me dizzy. It's too strong,' Sawamura's voice rings out in complaint from behind the door.

'Moron. Of course it is,' is Miyuki's reply. 'Look _over_ them.'

Every muscle in Youichi's body freezes momentarily and warning sirens blare in his head, because it's _those two_ inside the shed, and he's already seen plenty in the last week to put him off for a lifetime. It's enough of a miracle that he's been able to get any sleep at night with one of the two guilty parties sleeping in the bunk underneath him. But then again, he hears no moaning or gasping in there and the conversation sounds adequately innocent – right?

He carefully slides the door open just a hair's breadth.

Sawamura is backed up against one of the shelves, and Miyuki is almost thoroughly pressed up against him, painfully intimate, curved fingers grasping at the younger boy's waist; they're both still in their practice uniforms, but Miyuki has switched back to his eyeglasses – and his prescription sports goggles are lightly poised on Sawamura's face.

Slender pitcher's fingertips reach up and take hold of the goggles' temple, and Sawamura slides them down, _down_, slowly, like it's a dance, never breaking that rich gold gaze away from Miyuki's eyes; he pauses when they're close to halfway down the bridge of his nose, and he tilts his head just barely, almost unnoticeably, a mild questioning quirk smoothing in at the corner of his mouth.

'Yeah,' Miyuki rasps out breathlessly, pleasure coloring his voice. 'God, that's perfect.'

Youichi rolls his eyes so far backwards that he nearly sprains an optic nerve. Somehow it's not alarming at all that Miyuki has some weird-as-shit goggles fetish.

A sigh rolls tremulously off the tip of Miyuki's tongue, and he starts leaning in towards the side of Sawamura's throat; but Sawamura quickly presses a single finger against his mouth, halting him.

'Senpai,' he states openly, frowning. 'You're being awfully eager, aren't you.'

Suddenly there's a smile unfolding across the catcher's features, deceivingly soft like the roll of water on sand and as sharp as the jagged edges of rough pebbles, and his hand reaches up to curl around the one that's being pushed in his face; he gently pulls the hand away, pupils dilating, and Youichi takes just one glimpse of that stare and the familiar brief flash of teeth and he's uncomfortably aware of where this may be going.

'Didn't catch that,' he drawls, sounding electrified. 'Say it again?'

Sawamura lets out a genuine sigh of exasperation, but there's a touch of knowing in the crinkle of his eyes. 'It's tough imagining you being unable to catch anything. You're as nasty as usual,' he leans forward, roughened fingertips brushing over the junction where Miyuki's neck and shoulder meets, his lips moving to the tender lobe of Miyuki's ear. '… _Senpai_.'

And, apparently, that's all Miyuki can take. He shoves Sawamura back against the shelf, hard enough to bruise, almost merciless in his force; and then they're kissing, rough and roused and heated, hands fumbling urgently with each other's belts, and that's about enough for Youichi, _yeah, goodbye._

He slides the door back to a close and shakes his head incredulously, fingers coming up to pinch the bridge of his nose, because evidently Miyuki has a fetish for class seniority-related dirty talk as well, and that's _still_ not a surprise.

* * *

><p>And he seemingly never learns the lesson to avoid being the last to do anything anymore, even after the equipment shed ordeal, because Friday night rolls in far too quickly and Youichi is the last one out doing personal practice again. He's penned in an additional two hundred swings to his daily schedule since the start of the week, because after all he's been through, he's all but submerged in a frustration that itches at him like the prickle of a burning rash; sweeping his bat firmly through thin air in repetition seems to be the only thing giving him any kind of catharsis at this stage.<p>

So he's the last one to go get himself cleaned up, and it's the one thing he's been looking forward to the most for the end of the day – to let his thoughts and body go loose in the soothing wash of hot water and steam, poised with ease on the cusp of heaven; it's already late and the sky is dark out when he walks over leisurely to the communal bath, the mild evening air swirling across the skin and hairs of his bare upper body, his towel wrapped laxly around his waist for convenience.

He's already right outside the bathing area when he hears the ardent murmur of '_Please.'_

But the nerves and bones of his hand work faster than his brain, and he opens the door and immediately hates everything in his life.

It hadn't previously crossed his mind that just because he's the last one to get to the bath, doesn't mean that everyone else is done. Because _of course_ his fate will have it that Miyuki and Sawamura are still there, soaking in the tub; the younger boy is perched on Miyuki's lap amidst the lingering steam, his back flush against Miyuki's chest, slim fingers seemingly coiled around himself just beneath the water's surface and pumping collectedly at a warm, measured tempo. Scantly-parted lips trace whispered words at the base of Sawamura's nape, and the two of them are slowly, rhythmically shifting together, hips firmly ground, moving steadily against each other within the calm resistance of the water; Sawamura lightly tilts his head back, quiet long sighs of _Miyuki, Miyuki _rolling off the edges of his teeth, and Miyuki moves in like the pull of gravity, trailing the wet softness of his tongue tenderly across the curved angle of Sawamura's jawline.

The muscles on Youichi's face droop dismally like he's lost control of them. Those two dumb shits are fucking in the bath. They're actually _fucking in the bath_, the bath that literally everyone on the team uses. He's already starting to think about whether or not he ever wants to bathe in it again.

There's a little boy living inside of him that's dangerously close to sulking. And, as if to spite him, the towel around his waist suddenly loosens and plops to the ground like a wrinkled old dishrag. He lowers his head and stares at it blankly while he's left in nothing but his cotton boxer shorts.

He goes and swings a hundred more times, and makes certain to passionately fly-kick Sawamura the very moment the other boy returns to their shared dorm room.

* * *

><p>The pitch soars past him while he's at-bat; the call of <em>ball four<em> is distantly voiced somewhere in his surroundings. Long fingers slacken, and the bat rolls away from the bends of his knuckles and onto the earth, its metallic _clank_ a hazy and faraway echo. Dust rises slowly in its wake, accompanied by nothing but a heavy quiet; and then, as if everything is snapping violently into place, it all just bubbles up suddenly inside him out of nowhere.

'_What did I ever do?_' he complains loudly, almost petulant.

Ono demurely requests a time-out in the middle of their practice game, and Nori compassionately and understandingly comes off the mound to give him two more awkward pats on the back.

The social conversation rumbling across the dinner hall during that night's mealtime revolves around how, for some puzzling reason, Youichi seemed to have lost his shit over being walked.

* * *

><p>'I've seen things,' mumbles Maezono at practice a few days later. Dark circles flourish like blooming flowers upon the undersides of his eyes and his lids droop heavily with lack of sleep, and he generally looks like shit, which would be relatively comical to some extent except that Youichi's carrying his own fresh battle scars and has thus somehow developed a lot more empathy than usual.<p>

'What,' Youichi scoffs. 'Like Miyuki and Sawamura, you mean.'

A weighted, knowing silence immediately blankets everyone within a ten-meter radius of him, and that's the moment that the shortstop realizes that karma isn't singling him out: Miyuki and Sawamura have simply become comfortably fucking shameless to a degree that surpasses normal shameless people, because evidently he's not the only one who's seen things.

He eventually thinks it may be a good idea to talk to Miyuki about this, because he _is_ a somewhat-friend who cares and it could be Rei or a teacher or the coach walking in on them one day – and because his sanity will probably thank him for it once he's not seeing more of their grinding nude bodies than he has to – so he makes his way over to the spare communal study room adjacent to the dorms, where Miyuki had earlier mentioned he'd be to comb through scorebooks, and unhurriedly sweeps the door open.

'Hey,' he starts casually. 'I was –'

He's greeted with the sight of Miyuki sitting at the study desk, slightly hunched over with mild color dusting the hollow of his cheeks and low breathing coming out in uneven pants, firm fingers gripping far too tightly at the rim of the table and an unabashed flare of _thrill_ searing in the brown and gold flecks of his eyes; and it's a testament to exactly how much Youichi has seen in the past couple of weeks that he's not even affected or surprised by this anymore.

'Yo,' Miyuki breathes out unsteadily, boldly eyeballing him with a gratified, lopsided smirk.

Youichi tonelessly answers: 'Yo.'

The shortstop can't see Sawamura, but he turns his gaze towards the general direction of Miyuki's lap, obscured from view by the tabletop, and he lets out a long, loud sigh.

'Hey, Sawamura.'

There's a small, wantonly wet sound of tongue and lips and teeth from beneath the desk, a little rustling of fabric and the awkward shifting around of limbs, and then a relatively guilty voice biting out: '… Hi, Kuramochi-senpai.'

How he's managed to stay completely unnoticed by them throughout the past few weeks is a mystery to him, considering he's more or less been as subtle as they've been; but oddly, now that he's been seen, he's flooded over with a perversely strange relief to know that there's no escape this time.

* * *

><p>The thing is, nothing's actually changed since all of this had started, as far as he can tell. They're all young and they wear their hearts on their sleeves on the field – tightly weaving themselves, like intertwined fingers, into a gripping romance with a sport that they'll offer all their helpless love to for three years. Miyuki's steadfast dedication to his captaincy and his team is still unwavering, and his catching and calling work is still admittedly top-notch; Sawamura's golden-hearted ardor and support for his teammates is still wholesomely pure and clearly present at every turn, and his pitching work is still confidently, determinedly energetic and improving with every throw. Perhaps the two of them have been a little more touchy-feely during practices than before: an arm playfully slung over shoulders here, a single temperate pat on the back there; but Youichi senses no petty favoritism or preferential treatment in their gameplay. So maybe, he thinks – and he's surprised at how easily the layer of ice cracks apart and melts, a warm answer to a mouthed prayer of patience – it's all fine. Everything's good and as it should be, no matter what.<p>

But he's leaving the dining hall to go back to his dorm room after dinner that evening, and light footfalls still chase after him regardless – a faint fluttering of fledgling wings beating against the concrete.

'Kuramochi-senpai.'

And before he knows it, Sawamura has fallen into step beside him, panting lightly, a juvenile mess of long, gawky limbs and carelessly wrinkled clothes. It's so basic and youthful and _pure_, somehow; this boy can openly engage in the filthiest acts of depravity and still have an earnest honesty and a wholehearted purity to him that Youichi himself will never have.

Sawamura rubs the back of his head unusually placidly, and states: 'Look, about Miyuki-senpai –'

_Well, then._ Youichi pauses right where he is on the cement path and pivots on his heel to look at his roommate with a pointed stare, and Sawamura, seeing this, follows suit.

'… I'm going out with him,' he says.

Youichi openly peers at him like he's stupid, because this is quite possibly the most redundant and nonessential conversation starter he's ever taken part in. 'I never would've guessed,' he deadpans.

'Yeah. And, well –' Sawamura breathes thoughtfully, 'I'm sleeping with him.'

'_I know_,' answers Youichi with emphasis, kneading the space between his eyebrows incredulously. 'You guys have no goddamn shame. You know how many times I've walked in on you two? It's really hard to miss.'

At least the other boy has the decency to look a little apologetic at that. 'Ah – I'm sorry,' he mumbles with a barely-there trace of awkwardness, lowering his head.

The shortstop shakes his head dismissively and flaps his hand in Sawamura's direction. This ridiculous exchange is already starting to turn his insides into melting butter, sickeningly soft, which isn't the least bit acceptable; he thinks he may have to go swing a bat a few hundred times to feel manly again.

'But I'm also not sorry,' pronounces Sawamura unfalteringly, resolute gold eyes unexpectedly rising again to meet Youichi's gaze. 'Because – as gross as it is to say this, because it's _him_ – I kinda actually really, really like him. Just about as much as I hate him. And, well, I know he really, really likes me too. It's pretty disgusting and weird and embarrassing, but … I don't know. I wouldn't give it up for anything. We're happy.'

_Must be nice_, thinks Youichi distantly, mouth in an unpleasant slant; distasteful tendrils of warmth unfurl across the inside of his ribcage. They always did look like they felt complete. And there's no mistaking the mild contentment in the tenor of Sawamura's voice, a timbre of solace pouring from his lips. _The sound of happiness._

'God, stop it. You're saying nauseating things. It's mortifying.'

'Yeah, I know.' Sawamura's clearly grossed out at himself; his nose wrinkles innocently like a prune and the edges of his lips turn into a frown. But then every corner of his face suddenly springs to life, the creases vanishing, and he laughs brightly – a cheerfulness like the tinkling of bells.

Youichi rolls his eyes, reaches out and grasps firmly at his teammate's shoulder. 'Seriously though, brat,' he scoffs evenly. 'You're lucky it's me and not the coach or the principal or some teacher who's been walking in on you. I know that there's no way in hell I'd be able to stop you guys, so just – use your brains, yeah? Stop doing it in weird-as-fuck places. Or at least barricade the door or something. Or get Kominato to keep an eye out for people coming, or whatever. And if you ever want me to clear out of our room for the night, just freaking come to me and _ask_.'

Sawamura's eyes widen in wondrous disbelief, impossibly round and luminously gold and faintly curious, at that. 'What – wait, are you saying you'd actually do that for us?'

Youichi immediately sweeps his hand over and coils his entire arm around Sawamura's neck in a tight headlock, to the other boy's protesting squawks. 'You owe all of your upperclassmen a great deal of respect, you know that,' he bites out with annoyance, thoroughly unimpressed. 'And no one else needs an eyeful of you and that dumbass having your happy debauchery together.'

A few overenthusiastic wriggles on Sawamura's part, and he miraculously manages to duck out from under Youichi's arm, escaping the snug grip; he cheers noisily in victory, obnoxiously pumping a fist, hair in wild disarray and rising up in strange, oblique angles.

'You're actually being incredibly nice, Kuramochi-senpai. It's so creepy,' he teases knowingly, backing away, breathless with laughter.

'Shut up. You're completely to blame,' the shortstop snaps irritably. 'Man, I'm gonna ask if we can set up a gaming session at Zono's. I feel like I desperately need a horror game tonight to wash all of your sickly sweet shit out of my system.'

'I'll pass, thanks. You know I'm not good with horror,' replies Sawamura with a curl to his mouth, apprehensive.

'Next time, then. But most of us are probably gonna end up crashing there for the night, if it goes ahead. So if you feel like you just wanna stay back in our room – solo, or with company – or _with your man_,' says Youichi with a pointed pause, 'then it's fine.'

_How disgustingly soft-hearted_. Any softer and fluffier than that, and he'll be a circle of mold. At this rate, he's not going to be surprised if the other boy ends up calling him Marshmallow-senpai or something equally ridiculous at some point in the near future.

But one glimpse of Sawamura's answering smile, vibrant and appreciative and filled to the brim with sunshine, and he thinks that maybe he can deal with it.

* * *

><p>'Kuramochi-senpai,' Kominato says mid-walk, turning to him with a demure smile unfurling across his features, 'you're a remarkably generous person.'<p>

The two sets of low, cheery voices and quiet stirring movement audible from behind the door are as bright as falling stars, as intimate as veiled touches.

Youichi raises a single eyebrow at his underclassman. 'Too damn generous. A too-caring senpai, and a too-thoughtful wingman,' he agrees self-indulgently.

A consoling pause sweeps across their passage, a mutual silence filled in by the soft crunches of their footsteps against the concrete, and the rustling of the bags and light clanking of the drink cans that they're bringing back to Zono's. There's also the calm murmur of warm conversation and temperate muted laughter from the path behind him, from his room.

'They sound so revoltingly happy,' he complains. 'God, why don't I have a girlfriend. I wanna get laid too.'

'Good grief, senpai,' chides Kominato, his face turning a shade of pink to rival his hair; a sparkling peal of laughter rings out from Youichi's throat, deep-bellied and genuinely spirited and complete with a heartfelt _hyahaha_.

* * *

><p>Miyuki says thank you to him on the way to breakfast the next morning, but his features bear an infuriatingly shit-eating grin that makes him look like he's won something; predictably, it ends up annoying Youichi to no end.<p>

He disrespectfully jostles his captain so fiercely that the latter's glasses get knocked askew on his face, and _damn_ if that isn't satisfying as hell.


End file.
